(Eds: Combining related stories) New Delhi, Apr 29 () With lakhs of migrant workers and students stranded at various places for over a month due to the nationwide lockdown, the government on Wednesday announced plans to allow their movement to help them reach their homes, including by crossing state borders. The COVID-19 tally, in the meantime, rose further and fresh indications emerged about the lockdown continuing beyond May 3, at least in some form and in some parts of the country. In its evening update, the Union Health Ministry said the COVID-19 death toll has risen to 1,008, with a record jump of 71 in the last 24 hours, while the number of confirmed infections has climbed to 31,787 in the country with more than 1,800 cases getting detected since Tuesday evening. Close to 7,800 people have recovered too. Punjab, which has reported 375 cases and 19 deaths, announced extension of the lockdown in the state by two weeks after May 3, though some relaxations have been given in areas that do not fall under the containment or red zones. However, containment zones will continue to remain under total lockdown, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh said. In West Bengal, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said experts and doctors are of the opinion that the restrictions imposed to check the spread of COVID-19 should continue in the state till the end of May. She, however, also announced some relaxations, including opening of standalone shops in green zones and non-containment zones with all precautionary and social distancing measures. Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao has already announced extension of the lockdown in his state till May 7 without any relaxation. During his last interaction with chief ministers on Monday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had told them that the economy would need to be given importance too while fighting the COVID-19 pandemic. Ever since its emergence in China last December, more than 31 lakh have tested positive for the deadly virus infection worldwide while the death toll has topped 2 lakh. Some countries have, however, begun easing the lockdown. The US, which is among the worst hit globally, reported that its economy shrank at a 4.8 per cent annual rate in the last quarter, triggering a recession that will end the country's longest ever expansion period. Following guidelines from the Centre, some states in India have also allowed opening of standalone shops in non-containment zones, while several state governments have been demanding steps to allow movement of migrant workers to help them reach their respective homes. Some states including Uttar Pradesh have already undertaken special initiatives to bring back migrant workers and students. To help these people who have been stuck in various cities for over a month, many of whom have been left jobless and homeless due to the lockdown, the Union Home Ministry has now passed an order to allow their inter-state movement to reach their respective destinations, subject to certain conditions. This will also apply to pilgrims, tourists, students and other people stranded at different places. In the order, Union Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla said buses shall be used for transport of such groups of stranded people and these vehicles will be sanitised and will have to follow safe social distancing norms in seating. Listing the conditions, the ministry said all states and union territories should designate nodal authorities and develop standard protocols for receiving and sending such stranded persons. In case of movement beyond states or UTs, the sending and receiving states will need to consult each other and mutually agree to the movement by road. These people would be screened and only those found asymptomatic would be allowed to proceed. On arrival at their destination, they would be assessed by local health authorities and kept in home or institutional quarantine, as required by the assessment, the order said. In Maharashtra, Home Minister Anil Deshmukh said his government is in talks with chief ministers of other states over facilitating return of migrant workers to their native places in a planned manner. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said he is in touch with other state governments on the Home Ministry order and told migrant workers to stay put till he informs them about the final decision in one or two days. Mumbai and Delhi are among major urban centres where a large number of workers from other states are stranded and have been demanding transport arrangements be made for them to go back to their native places. Some states are said to be reluctant in allowing return of their natives from other places due to fears of the infection. The University Grants Commission (UGC), in the meantime, said the new academic session for freshers will begin in universities from September and for already enrolled students in August. It also advised universities to follow a six-day week pattern and devise proforma to record travel or stay history of staff members and students for the lockdown period. The central government also asked its 48.34 lakh employees to download 'Aarogya Setu' mobile app immediately and report to office only when it shows "safe" status for commuting. The app, developed by the government, helps people assess themselves on the risk of them contracting the coronavirus infection. According to the latest Health Ministry data, there are close to 23,000 active COVID-19 cases in the country. Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan said of the total active COVID-19 cases in the country, only 0.33 per cent patients are on ventilators, 1.5 per cent are on oxygen support and 2.34 per cent are in ICU. Of the total 1,008 deaths, as per the Ministry figures, Maharashtra tops the tally while it also has the highest number of confirmed cases in the country. In Maharashtra, Mumbai's Dharavi area reported 14 new coronavirus cases on Wednesday, taking the overall tally to 344. Dharavi, considered as the biggest slum in Asia, has so far reported 18 deaths. In the national capital, the new confirmed cases included 11 family members of an LNJP Hospital dietician, who had earlier tested positive. However, none of the hospital employees, who came in contact with the dietician, have tested positive. Tamil Nadu Chief Minister K Palaniswami said the spread of COVID-19 in the state is largely under control, but the contagion is "easily" spreading in Chennai due to its large population. Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot told in an interview that the state's count of more than 2,000 COVID-19 cases is not a cause of worry because his government's objective is to ensure not a single case goes undetected. ACB PLB AKV NSK SLB SA PNT ENM BJBJ

COVID-19: Govt allows migrants to go home; Positive cases near 32,000

What it's like working for lawmakers whose golden years are clouded by power struggles, rumors of senility, and constant second-guessing

Cecilia Fabiano/LaPresse via APWorkers disinfect the buildings that host the Region Lazio in Rome, on March 8, 2020.<ul class="summary-list"><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-graphic-where-cases-are-surging-spread-is-accelerating-2020-3">Italy has become a new epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak</a>, with over 41,000 cases and 3,400 deaths.</li><li>Two northern regions, Lombardy and Veneto, reported the country's first cases on February 21. </li><li>However, their responses differed: Veneto issued multiple rounds of testing for residents, even those without symptoms, and isolated patients that tested positive. Lombardy lagged in testing those who were asymptomatic.</li><li>Nearly a month later, Lombardy has reported far more cases than Veneto - indicating that aggressive testing and isolation can be an effective response.</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/?hprecirc-bullet">Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories</a>.</li></ul>When two regions in northern Italy realized the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/china-virus-everything-we-know-deadly-2019-ncov-wuhan-spread-2020-1#chinese-authorities-launched-an-investigation-in-the-first-week-of-january-amid-fears-that-the-virus-could-be-like-sars-that-coronavirus-also-originated-in-china-and-killed-774-people-from-november-2002-to-july-2003-5">new coronavirus</a> had been <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-in-charts-covid-19-symptoms-spread-deaths-warnings-2020-2">spreading undetected</a> through their communities in February, their governments had to decide how much to limit residents' mobility and how to use limited resources to treat sick people.The regions - Lombardy and Veneto - are provinces in northern Italy that hold Milan and Venice, respectively. The two took different tacks: Veneto imposed travel restrictions early and started testing all residents that had come into contact with the coronavirus patients, even if they weren't showing symptoms. Lombardy, however, only tested residents that showed symptoms and had difficulty enforcing a lockdown in the region. Nearly a month later, data reveals that these approaches resulted in different outcomes: Veneto has seen a slower rate of increase in new cases and deaths than Lombardy.The data suggests that <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/italy-closing-all-stores-except-groceries-pharmacies-coronavirus-2020-3">more aggressive testing and restrictive travel rules</a> can slow the pandemic, which is what the World Health Organization has been calling for."Our key message is: test, test, test," Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO's director-general, said at a press briefing on Monday.<h2>Italy is the new epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic</h2>As the number of new coronavirus patients reported in China have slowed, they have grown quickly in Italy. Italy is now the epicenter of the pandemic - over 41,000 Italians have tested positive, and 3,400 have died. Two cases were detected in Veneto and 14 in Lombardo on February 21. It's not yet known how the virus first entered the northern regions.In response, the regions began implementing lockdowns on February 23. The restrictions applied to 10 towns in Lombardy and one in Veneto, affecting approximately 50,000 people. Trucks were able to still get in and out with essential supplies, but police roadblocks kept residents inside the lockdown zones.Still, cases grew exponentially. Within a week, nearly 900 people had tested positive for the disease and 21 had died in Italy.A few weeks later, on March 8, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/italy-lockdown-lombardy-11-provinces-coronavirus-crisis-2020-3">the Italian prime minister announced that all 60 million residents</a> would be put under lockdown.Daniele Mascolo/ReutersPolice officers talk with people at Milan's main train station, following a government decree that shut down large areas in the north of the country, to stem coronavirus contagion, on March 9, 2020.<h2>Veneto's response</h2>Italy's first coronavirus death came in the town of Vo Euganeo, in Veneto, on February 21. In response, the town tested approximately 3,300 residents in late February, according to <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/0dba7ea8-6713-11ea-800d-da70cff6e4d3">The Financial Times.</a> The city also did multiple rounds of testing, which allowed for the discovery of more cases.The virus' <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-incubation-period-5-days-average-can-exceed-2-weeks-2020-3">incubation period is about five days on average</a>, though in outlier patients, the period can last longer than two weeks.The tests in Veneto found that people without symptoms accounted for more than half of all the positive cases, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-italy-lombardy/coronavirus-may-be-slowing-in-italys-worst-hit-region-governor-idUSKBN2131TX">Reuters</a> reported. Associated PressEmpty St. Mark's Square after the quarantine order in Venice, Italy, on March 9, 2020.Veneto quickly imposed a strict quarantine on all people who tested positive, even those that were asymptomatic. Towns also went into lockdown: Stores and schools closed, while sports games and church services were postponed or canceled.Almost a month later, the rate of coronavirus case growth in Veneto has slowed. The region reported 2,704 total cases on Tuesday. However, cases are rising elsewhere in the country. Both Lombardy and another nearby northern region, Emilia Romagna, have reported far more cases than Veneto. <h2>The coronavirus in the Lombardy region</h2>Lombardy has been most affected by the coronavirus - more than 16,200 cases and 1,200 deaths had been reported there as of Tuesday. That's a steep rise from the original 14 reported on February 21, and a vast difference from Veneto's count. (The fact that Lombardy initially reported more cases than Veneto, however, suggests its outbreak could have been larger and farther along to begin with.)When Lombardy went into lockdown on February 23, the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/28/world/europe/italy-coronavirus-quarantine.html?">New York Times reported</a>, non-essential stores were closed, residents were told to stay in place, and police were brought in to enforce the shut down. But checkpoints between locked-down towns and free towns nearby were porous, and residents continued to shop and dine out.Maurizio Pedrinazzi, a 60-year-old street cleaner in the town of Secugnago in the Lombardy region, told the Times that despite the quarantine, people in locked-down towns often stopped into the nearby village bars for drinks."They know the country roads, the shortcuts," Pedrinazzi told the Times. "They all come here."According to <a href="https://www.wired.co.uk/article/coronavirus-italy">Wired</a>, Lombardy governor Attilio Fontana told the regional parliament that the coronavirus was "just a little more than normal flu" on February 25. The following day, the region relaxed the restrictions on bars and restaurants.But on March 1, the region put its lockdown back into place as more residents fell sick. One of Fontana's aides was infected, and Fontana went into isolation.By March, when Italy's full nation-wide lockdown was issued, experts believe that it may have been too late - the virus had already been widely spread by carriers who may have been asymptomatic.Associated PressItalian Foreign Minister Luigi di Maio holds up a map of Italy showing the municipalities in regions of Lombardy and Veneto during a press conference at the foreign press association, in Rome, February 27, 2020.Lombardy's hospitals became overloaded: Over the past three weeks, 1,135 people have required intensive care in the region, but it only has 800 intensive care beds, according to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-italy-ethics-speci/all-is-well-in-italy-triage-and-lies-for-virus-patients-idUSKBN2133KG">Reuters</a>.Italy also has <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/italy-coronavirus-old-population-cases-death-rate-2020-3">one of the world's oldest populations</a>, with 60% of residents over age 40 and 23% over 65. Coronavirus death rates are highest among older patients.<h2>Lower rates of new cases in Veneto compared to Lombardy</h2>Veneto's success in decreasing the rate of growth of the coronavirus outbreak there within a month suggests that aggressive testing and increased social distancing measures work. These findings could inform policy-making and decisions in other countries, including the UK and the US.Alfredo Falcone/LaPresse via APThe Colosseum, which closed following the Italian government's ban on public gatherings, is reflected in a puddle where a face mask was left, in Rome, on March 8, 2020.Leaders in both places have faced criticism for not making testing widely available early enough. Without testing large swaths of the population who could be asymptomatic carriers, the health and well-being of vulnerable populations, such as the elderly and those with preexisting conditions, are more at risk.In the US, according to the <a href="https://covidtracking.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">COVID Tracking Project</a>, a test-tracking resource <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2020/03/how-understand-your-states-coronavirus-numbers/607921/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">from two journalists at The Atlantic and the founder of a medical-data startup</a>, about 100,000 tests have been run - a giant increase from Monday, when only about 40,000 had been conducted.<ul class="read-more-links"><li>Read more:</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-death-rate-by-age-countries-2020-3">The coronavirus death rate is roughly 3.4%, but that doesn't tell the full story. Here's everything we know so far about how deadly COVID-19 really is.</a></li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-protective-measures-keep-outbreak-from-overwhelming-hospitals-2020-3">One chart explains why Disneyland, Broadway, and sports arenas are all going dark to stop the coronavirus epidemic</a></li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/countries-on-lockdown-coronavirus-italy-2020-3">Countries that are on lockdown because of coronavirus</a></li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-150-million-americans-may-get-infected-2020-3">Multiple experts say up to 70% of Americans could be infected with the coronavirus and 1 million could die if no treatment is found - so people over 60 should 'stay home unless it's critical'</a></li></ul> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-myths-debunked-wuhan-china-2020-2">Pathologists debunk 13 myths about the coronavirus, including why masks won't help</a></h3>

2 regions of Italy took different approaches to fighting the coronavirus. Their results show that widespread testing and early social distancing really work.

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Business Insider spoke to an internal medicine doctor at a hospital in New York CIty five times in seven days as the coronavirus was ramping up in the city. </li><li>He described the constant need to find more space to put patients, the severity of the disease in the patients he's seeing, and what he's concerned about as NYC becomes the epicenter of the pandemic. </li><li>It shows just how quickly patients with coronavirus are overwhelming doctors inside the New York City health system. </li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/?hprecirc-bullet">Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories</a>.</li></ul>Sunday, March 15, was the day it all changed.That day, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-ny-governor-worried-hospitals-will-run-out-of-beds-2020-3">called on President Donald Trump</a> to mobilize the military in response to the coronavirus pandemic. Hospitals in New York began <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-pandemic-hospitals-postpone-elective-procedures-2020-3">calling off elective procedures</a>. The state had 729 reported cases, <a href="https://www.governor.ny.gov/news/governor-cuomo-calls-president-trump-take-comprehensive-federal-action-combat-novel-coronavirus#">329 of which were in New York City.</a>The same day, the coronavirus pandemic became very real in the life of an internal medicine doctor practicing in a hospital in New York City. A handful of doctors he works with had been sent home for potential coronavirus exposure. "I was realizing that every day the number was doubling," he told Business Insider. The cases of COVID-19 were drastically going up day by day. "This is the beginning."Over the week starting March 16, the number of cases in New York skyrocketed to 20,875, 12,305 of which were in New York City as of March 23. Overall, the state<a href="https://www.insider.com/new-york-coronavirus-pandemic-epicenter-in-us-2020-3"> accounts for nearly 6% of worldwide cases, making it an epicenter of the pandemic.</a> Business Insider spoke with the doctor five times over the course of the week by phone and text to get a sense of the day-to-day changes he was seeing.The doctor, whose identity is known to Business Insider, spoke under the condition of anonymity because he had not been authorized by his hospital to speak to the press. What the doctor described gives a sense of how hospitals are grappling with that skyrocketing case count. The following is a day-by-day diary of my interactions with the doctor.Do you work at a hospital in New York? Business Insider would like to hear what you're seeing on the frontlines of the coronavirus response. Email the author at <a href="mailto:lramsey@businessinsider.com">lramsey@businessinsider.com</a>. <h2>Monday, March 16: Learning on the go</h2>NYC has <a href="https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/coronavirus/2020/03/16/new-york-city-up-to-463-coronavirus-cases--7-deaths">463 cases reported and 7 deaths</a>The doctor was already tired after his 12-hour shift."It is exhausting," he said on a phone call that evening. Caring for the increasing number of coronavirus patients in the hospital requires a lot of learning on the go, he said. He was treating patients who had tested positive for the COVID-19 virus with oxygen and the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/chloroquine-hydroxychloroquine-shortage-coronavirus-treatment-lupus-arthritis-2020-3">anti-malarial medication hydroxychloroquine</a>. He noticed that more patients with confirmed cases were being admitted into the hospital than were being discharged. There was still space in regular hospital beds, known as the floor, and in the intensive care unit for more critical patients, but doctors were already discussing what to do once they filled up, he said.At that point, the situation was already overwhelming the hospital compared to pre-pandemic day-to-day operations. "It's not built for rapid-onset pandemics," he said. <h2>Tuesday, March 17: 'It's like we're fighting a ghost'</h2>NYC <a href="https://www.nydailynews.com/coronavirus/ny-coronavirus-new-york-city-bill-de-blasio-20200318-jlfm5hwyl5ahrow53pmaobf4ja-story.html">has 923 cases and 10 deaths</a>.On Tuesday, March 17, the reality of shortages and challenges to the hospital were becoming clearer. "Maybe not tomorrow, but I can't see how it won't happen in the coming weeks, " he texted me. The threat and mystery of the pandemic had crystallized as well. "It's like we're fighting a ghost," he said. "I know it's out there, but I have no idea where it's coming from, who it's affecting the hardest, and how to stop it. We're collectively flailing in every direction, but at this point it's always one step ahead - undetected."<h2>Wednesday, March 18: The ICU is full</h2>NYC has <a href="https://www.nydailynews.com/coronavirus/ny-coronavirus-nyc-de-blasio-cuomo-20200318-otppdnoapna6lco35dgkyugitq-story.html">1,871 cases and 11 deaths.</a>By Wednesday, the intensive care unit had filled up. For overflow, the hospital converted a unit that was usually used for patients transitioning from intensive care to the general hospital into another ICU. The only problem: compared to the ICU, doctors treating patients with COVID-19 in the new unit had to wear <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/doctors-frontlines-coronavirus-protective-gear-running-out-2020-3">full protective gear,</a> sometimes referred to as "bunny suits," to manage patients. "There just aren't enough ICU beds" he told me by phone. By Wednesday, he had transferred multiple patients from the floor to the ICU. "Everything's accelerated," he said. To make sure staff weren't getting overwhelmed, the hospital had been adding additional doctors to the floor. Each oversees about 20 patients.By Wednesday, supply shortages were starting to hit the hospital, too. That meant re-using equipment, limiting the number of times healthcare workers went into patient rooms, and reserving materials like N95 masks.With elective procedures halted, the surgical intensive care unit was lined up for patients once the converted unit was full. It's the first time the doctor's seen a hospital convert units on the fly. "Everyone knows they can get called in," the doctor said. "We don't know what the ceiling is."<h2>Thursday, March 19: The case count doubles</h2>NYC has <a href="https://nypost.com/2020/03/19/nyc-coronavirus-cases-reach-3615-people-22-dead/">3,615 cases and 22 deaths.</a>On Thursday, a day the case count doubled, I didn't hear from the doctor.<h2>Friday, March 20: Worries about ventilators mount</h2>NYC has <a href="https://1010wins.radio.com/articles/nyc-coronavirus-deaths-jump-to-29-as-cases-rise-to-5151">5,151 cases and 29 deaths.</a>Friday brought an almost 50% increase in patients on the floor, the doctor said. Supplies were becoming an issue as materials were being used in quantities the doctor hadn't seen before. "No one could be prepared for such an insidious and rapid rise," he said on the phone that evening. The needs of patients getting admitted to the hospital were becoming more complex too, he said, and patients in the hospital weren't getting discharged as quickly as they once were. Over in critical care, the first unit that had been converted to intensive care had filled up, and patients with COVID-19 had started filling the surgical ICU as well. The doctor said he was trying hard not to send patients from the hospital floor to the ICU unless absolutely necessary.Once the surgical ICU is full, the hospital plans to convert more units into critical care. By then, the hospital may be at risk of running short on <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-intensive-care-unit-shortages-of-ventilators-staff-space-2020-3">ventilators</a>, the equipment used to help patients breathe."If we don't slow down the progression, and really tangibly flatten the curve, that could very well happen," he said. "I didn't expect it to be this quick. "<h2>Saturday, March 21: Cases continue to rise</h2>NYC has <a href="https://patch.com/new-york/new-york-city/nyc-coronavirus-cases-near-6k-restrictions-begin">6,211 cases and 43 deaths.</a> On Saturday, I didn't hear from the doctor again. That day, he later told me, the number of patients admitted to the hospital with COVID-19 had risen by 30%.<h2>Sunday March 22: 'It's like leaning over the edge of a cliff'</h2>NYC has <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/22/nyregion/Coronavirus-new-York-epicenter.html">10,764 cases and 99 deaths.</a>Sunday saw the patient count rise 18% on the hospital floors.By that point, staff were being pulled in from other parts of the hospital. Floors had been repurposed for COVID-19 patients, and some deaths had occured among patients who were on the hospital floor, but not admitted to the ICU. The doctor said he was still using hydroxychloroquine to treat patients, though he noted shortages that make it difficult for patients to get prescriptions when they leave the hospitals.In his practice, he's using it only when patients are having a hard time breathing as a result of the virus. The number of patients who've been admitted continues to grow as more are in for extended stays. And the patients who were stable enough to go home, he found, didn't always want to go home for fear of what would happen next. The doctor's patient load has continued to grow."We've gotten used to a certain level of chaos," he said. Overall, as the hospital has tackled the pandemic, camaraderie among his colleagues has been strong, he said. Teammates have been supportive of one another even when stretched to the limits. As the hospital sees admissions go up, the number of patients in the ICU has also swelled, he said. For now, his big worry is finding places to put all the patients admitted and make sure they're cared for. "I still feel like we haven't seen the full extent," he said. "It's like leaning over the edge of a cliff." <ul class="read-more-links"><li>Read more:</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-telehealth-changing-how-americans-see-doctor-online-2020-3">The coronavirus pandemic is transforming how Americans get their healthcare - we spoke to 3 companies driving the online shift</a></li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-primary-care-doctors-villagemd-chenmed-2020-3">Primary care doctors are delivering toilet paper, testing patients in their cars, and going online to combat the coronavirus epidemic</a></li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-oscar-health-is-working-with-hhs-on-survey-and-test-locator-2020-3">The Trump administration is working with the healthcare startup founded by Jared Kushner's brother to power a coronavirus tool</a></li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/presentation-how-hospitals-are-preparing-for-us-coronavirus-outbreak-2020-3">A leaked presentation reveals the document US hospitals are using to prepare for a major coronavirus outbreak. It estimates 96 million US coronavirus cases and 480,000 deaths.</a></li></ul><a href="/intelligence/digital-health?IR=T&amp;itm_source=businessinsider&amp;itm_medium=ctgr_bii&amp;itm_term=ctgr_subscription&amp;itm_content=health&amp;itm_campaign=digital-health"></a>Featured Digital Health Articles: - <a href="/telehealth-industry-explained">Telehealth Industry: Benefits, Services &amp; Examples</a> - <a href="/value-based-care-pay-for-performance-healthcare-model">Value-Based Care Model: Pay-for-Performance Healthcare</a> - <a href="/senior-care-market-trends">Senior Care &amp; Assisted Living Market Trends</a> - <a href="/wearable-technology-healthcare-medical-devices">Smart Medical Devices: Wearable Tech in Healthcare</a> - <a href="/artificial-intelligence-healthcare">AI in Healthcare</a> - <a href="/remote-patient-monitoring-industry-explained">Remote Patient Monitoring Industry: Devices &amp; Market Trends</a>

We talked to an NYC doctor about the coronavirus crisis over the course of a week as cases ramped up at his hospital. He said it's 'like leaning over the edge of a cliff.'

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">US Marine Corps/Pfc. Kindo GoMarine Corps field radio operators dismount a free space optic system from a tactical elevated antenna mass at Camp Hansen, Okinawa, August 17, 2018.</div></div></div><ul><li>The US military is getting ready for a potential conflict against a powerful adversary whose capabilities may nearly match those of the US.</li><li>In addition to more lethal weaponry, such an adversary would have greater electronic warfare capabilities, meaning it could intercept communications and use them against US forces.</li><li>The Pentagon is looking at ways to fend off such interference, and one way to do that is to get of the radio-frequency spectrum altogether.</li></ul>As the Pentagon reorients toward great-power competition with adversaries like Russia and China, its preparations go beyond <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/marines-alaska-cold-weather-training-2018-8" target="_blank" rel="noopener">learning to ski</a> and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/us-army-ironhorse-brigade-armor-unit-training-to-travel-around-europe-2018-5" target="_blank" rel="noopener">practicing to drive across Europe.</a>US military units rely on wireless networks and radio-frequency communications to talk on the battlefield, sharing intelligence, targeting data, and orders.But concern is growing that rivals like China and Russia could pick up those transmissions and jam them, change them to confuse or deceive, or track them to target the people sending and receiving them - tactics Russia and Russian-backed forces <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cyber-ukraine/russian-hackers-tracked-ukrainian-artillery-units-using-android-implant-report-idUSKBN14B0CU" target="_blank" rel="noopener">are believed</a> to have <a href="https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20170514/15060437365/russian-military-apparently-using-cell-tower-spoofers-to-send-propaganda-directly-to-ukrainian-soldiers-phones.shtml" target="_blank" rel="noopener">used before.</a>The Pentagon has started exploring the use of laser communications systems that are harder to detect and disrupt.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">US Marine Corps/Sgt. Timothy ValeroMarine Corps field radio operators remove the free space optic system from a tactical elevated antenna mass at Camp Hansen, Okinawa, August 17, 2018.</div></div></div>The <keyword id="6354810" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="defense">Defense</keyword> Advanced Research Projects Agency has been <a href="https://www.militaryaerospace.com/articles/2015/12/free-space-optical.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">working on</a> sensors and hardware to send and receive signals from free-space optical technology - which sends light beams through the air rather than a cable - for some time.Early last year, the Defense Department awarded $45 million for a three-year project involving three of the service branches, focused on developing a laser communications system - "basically fiber optic communications without the fiber," Linda Thomas, whose team at the Naval Research Laboratory got about one-third of the grant money, <a href="https://breakingdefense.com/2017/05/say-it-with-lasers-45m-dod-prize-for-optical-coms/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told Breaking Defense</a> at the time.Thomas' team's Tactical Line-of-sight Optical communications Network, or TALON, was able to send messages through laser beams over distances similar to those of Marine Corps tactical radios, which typically can range to about 45 miles.Free-space-optical communications systems are available commercially, but their range is limited. The Naval Research Lab team was able to exceed the range of those systems, a problem that involved sending the low-power beam through the atmosphere without it being made unintelligible, though Thomas <a href="https://breakingdefense.com/2017/05/say-it-with-lasers-45m-dod-prize-for-optical-coms/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">didn't say</a> how they did it.Marines have already gone into the field to test a free-space optics system developed by the Naval Research Lab.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">US Marine Corps/Pfc. Kindo GoMarines lift a tactical elevated antenna mass mounted with the free space optic system at Camp Hansen, Okinawa, August 17, 2018.</div></div></div>Marines from the III Marine Expeditionary Force tested a free-space optics system that "transfers data on a highly secured and nearly undetectable infrared laser, separate from the radio frequency spectrum" in Okinawa this month, <a href="https://www.dvidshub.net/news/289920/marines-test-future-wireless-communications" target="_blank" rel="noopener">according</a> to a Marine Corps release.The mobile system allows more data - larger files and imagery - to be transmitted without using more of the radio-frequency spectrum, "an already constrained resource," one of the Marines involved said."When it first came up, we thought it would be a lot more difficult to set up and understand," <a href="https://www.dvidshub.net/news/289920/marines-test-future-wireless-communications" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a> Marine Sgt. William Holt, a cyber-systems administrator. "When the Marines heard 'free space optics' and 'lasers,' they got nervous about that. Then when they actually got behind the gear and were able to operate it, it was easier than expected."Thomas and other engineers from the Naval Research Laboratory were also on hand."We came out to Okinawa because it was one of the harshest humid environments with highly variable weather on very short time scales," she <a href="https://www.dvidshub.net/news/289920/marines-test-future-wireless-communications" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said.</a> "We are looking at how the system operates and handles these conditions and how we can better fulfill the needs of the future Marine Corps."<h2>'The threat is out there'</h2><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Russian Ministry of DefenseRussian troops participating in Zapad-2017.</div></div></div>US Marines are not the only ones gearing up to communicate in a contested environment.China's People's Liberation Army considers electronic warfare a central component of its operations, and its EW doctrine "emphasizes using electromagnetic spectrum weapons to suppress or to deceive enemy electronic equipment," the Defense Department said in a report about Chinese military capabilities released this month.Chinese units "routinely conduct jamming and antijamming operations against multiple communication and radar systems and GPS satellite systems in force-on-force exercises," the report said. In addition to testing Chinese troops' ability to use these systems, such tests "help improve confidence in their ability to operate effectively in a complex electromagnetic environment."Russian forces carried out similar tests during the massive Zapad 2017 exercise conducted late last year.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">US Army/Staff Sgt. Michael CardenA training specialist from the Army Space and Missile Defense Agency shows Army National Guard soldiers on how to detect electromagnetic interference on a GPS receiver, June 23, 2018.</div></div></div>According to Estonia's military intelligence chief, Col. Kaupo Rosin, the amount of jamming Russia deployed against its own forces during that exercise "was at a level we haven't seen.""The threat of the Russians is that if they are jammed, they can fall back into a civilian infrastructure on their own land, which gives them an advantage in operating in the vicinity of Russia," Rosin <a href="https://www.defensenews.com/interviews/2017/11/26/interview-col-kaupo-rosin-estonias-military-intelligence-chief/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told Defense News</a> last last year. "So they have that advantage."US troops have also tested their capacity to thwart electronic interference.Ohio National Guard troops trained with a team from the Army's Space and Missile Defense Command this summer in order to be to detect and mitigate cyberattacks on GPS systems."There are adversaries out there with the capability to deny, degrade and disrupt our capabilities," <a href="https://www.army.mil/article/207788/soldiers_train_to_detect_defend_against_electronic_warfare" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a> Capt. Kyle Terza from US Army Space and Missile Defense Command. "The threat is out there and ... we have to be trained and ready to operate without it." <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/heres-what-cyberwar-with-north-korea-could-look-like-kim-jong-un-nuclear-mirai-botnet-hackers-hacking-left-of-launch-2017-11">What a cyberwar with North Korea could look like, according to a cybersecurity expert</a></h3> <div> </div> </div>

The Pentagon is worried about getting jammed by Russia and China, so it's testing lasers to go off the grid

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd"><html><body><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div>If the air conditioning in one of San Bernardino County's 34 government buildings malfunctions, facility maintenance staff receive an alert on their iPads.Thanks to the information that the Siemens Building Automation System (BAS) provides, they often know exactly what's wrong before building occupants even realize the system is down.Using this data, they gather the right tools, make a beeline for the building, and resolve the issue with maximum efficiency.With buildings spread across the county's more than 20,000 square miles, the proactive mobile technology of the Siemens BAS has made a huge difference in San Bernardino County's building maintenance operations - to the tune of $405,800 in savings in the first three years alone."The idea was to develop a system that could unleash productivity, and this was a perfect example of everyone coming together to meet a shared vision," says Akshay Grover, senior account executive for the Building Technologies Division of Siemens Industry, Inc. in Los Angeles, who manages the San Bernardino County account.How can connectivity make such a difference? Consider the county's former operations: An air conditioning malfunction would likely remain undetected until building workers were already miserable and their productivity was dropping. Facility maintenance staff might then have a 90-minute, one-way drive to evaluate the issue. Only then could they determine what tools and parts were necessary, acquire them, and set about resolving the issue.The Siemens BAS has created significant results for the county - $288,131 in energy and natural gas savings has been realized. The county has lowered payroll costs by $91,793. Driving nearly 40,000 fewer miles for service calls has reduced greenhouse gas emissions and generated $25,872 in fuel savings."There have been real dollar savings in doing this," says Joe Sutcliffe, Information Services Department division chief for San Bernardino County.<h2>Saving more than money</h2>Then there are the repairs that San Bernardino maintenance workers never have to make in the first place. The dramatic time savings allow employees to perform preventative maintenance, rather than simply putting out fires."If you take care of something and make sure it's well oiled and everything is going as it should," says Sutcliffe, "you don't necessarily have to worry about something breaking on you."Another benefit is that the Siemens BAS uses BACnet protocol to integrate seamlessly with third-party systems, such as the county's existing generators, uninterrupted power supply (UPS) systems, water treatment controllers, and lighting control systems. "The Siemens BAS acts as a focal point and provides in-depth control and monitoring of different systems to the county through a click of a button," says Grover.That's crucial for a government entity that makes purchases through a competitive bidding process and can't always return to the same vendor for every item."If there's a piece of equipment that we need to buy, we can integrate that into the Siemens system," Sutcliffe adds.While the benefits of saving money, time, and resources for a for-profit entity are clear, Sutcliffe notes that the advantages for public organizations are particularly profound."We're saving the citizens' tax dollars," he says. "I'm not only an employee of the county, but I'm a citizen. I want my tax dollars spent wisely."<a href="http://w3.usa.siemens.com/buildingtechnologies/us/en/Pages/buildingtechnologiesusa.aspx?stc=uscg102364&amp;sp_source=uscg102364" target="_blank">For more information about Siemens and its BAS technology, click here.</a>This post is sponsored by <a href="http://www.usa.siemens.com/entry/en/" target="_blank">Siemens</a>.</body></html>Find out <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/sponsor-posts">more about Sponsor Content</a>.

How Siemens technology saved a California county's residents more than $400,000 in tax dollars

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right click-to-enlarge"><div><div class="image on-image"><a title_source="REUTERS/Rick Wilking" title_caption="" class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/5407396feab8ea5522fded2e-960/cellphone-tower-1.jpg"></a>REUTERS/Rick Wilking</div></div></div>Seventeen fake cellphone towers were discovered across the U.S. last week, <a href="http://www.popsci.com/article/technology/mysterious-phony-cell-towers-could-be-intercepting-your-calls">according to a report in Popular Science.</a>
Rather than offering you cellphone service, the towers appear to be connecting to nearby phones, bypassing their encryption, and either tapping calls or reading texts. 
Les Goldsmith, the CEO of ESD America, used ESD's CryptoPhone 500 to detect 17 bogus cellphone towers. <a href="http://esdamerica.com/">ESD</a> is a leading American defense and law enforcement technology provider based in Las Vegas. 
With most phones, these fake communication towers towers are undetectable. But not for the CryptoPhone 500. <a href="http://www.cryptophone.de/en/products/mobile/cp500/">It is a customized Android device that is disguised as a Samsung Galaxy S III</a>, but has highly-advanced encryption.
<a href="http://www.popsci.com/article/technology/mysterious-phony-cell-towers-could-be-intercepting-your-calls">Goldsmith told Popular Science: </a>"Interceptor use in the U.S. is much higher than people had anticipated. One of our customers took a road trip from Florida to North Carolina and he found eight different interceptors on that trip. We even found one at South Point Casino in Las Vegas."
The towers were found in July, but the report implied that there may have been more out there.
Although it is unclear who owns the towers, ESD found that several of them were located near U.S. military bases. 
"Whose interceptor is it? Who are they, that's listening to calls around military bases? Is it just the U.S. military, or are they foreign governments doing it? The point is: we don't really know whose they are," <a href="http://www.popsci.com/article/technology/mysterious-phony-cell-towers-could-be-intercepting-your-calls">Goldsmith said to Popular Science.</a>
It's probably not the NSA - <a href="http://venturebeat.com/2014/09/02/who-is-putting-up-interceptor-cell-towers-the-mystery-deepens/">that agency can tap all it wants without the need for bogus towers</a>, VentureBeat reported: 
Not the NSA, cloud security firm SilverSky CTO/SVP Andrew Jaquith told us. "The NSA doesn't need a fake tower," he said. "They can just go to the carrier" to tap your line.
ComputerWorld points out that the fake towers give themselves away by <a href="http://www.computerworld.com/article/2600348/mobile-security/are-your-calls-being-intercepted-17-fake-cell-towers-discovered-in-one-month.html">crushing down the performance of your phone from 4G to 2G while the intercept is taking place</a>. So if you see your phone operating on a slow download signal while you're near a military base ... maybe make that call from somewhere else. 
In an amazing coincidence, <a href="http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/09/cities-scramble-to-upgrade-stingray-tracking-as-end-of-2g-network-looms/">police departments in a handful of U.S. cities have been operating "Stingray" or "Hailstorm" towers</a> which - you guessed it - conduct surveillance on mobile phone activity. They do that by jamming mobile phone signals, forcing phones to drop down from 4G and 3G network bands to the older, more insecure 2G band.

Mysterious Fake Cellphone Towers Are Intercepting Calls All Over The U.S.

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div>At a <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/hillary-clinton-talks-about-her-emails-2015-3">press conference</a> on Tuesday, Hillary Clinton assured the public that there were "no security breaches" on the private server she used to send and receive emails during her time as secretary of state. But <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/cyber-expert-hillarys-press-conference-did-not-inspire-confidence-2015-3">cyber experts are saying</a> that there is no way she could know whether her account was ever compromised by hackers, who constantly attempt to detect security holes in email servers and stealthily exploit them."There have been times when I've hacked into a customer's server, collected data, and gotten out, and the customer never had any indication that their system had been compromised," ethical hacker David Chronister of <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/204353?trk=prof-0-ovw-curr_pos">Parameter Security</a> told Business Insider. "There's this misconception that if someone is attacked they'll know right away, but unless the hacker really screws up, the target won't know until it's too late."The 2016 Democratic presidential front-runner also said that the personal server "was on property guarded by the Secret Service."However, the former secretary of state did not provide details about the technical team that oversaw the personal system, which would involve several experts constantly looking for hackers if it was a government system."You can never lock down a network enough to fully avoid the truly stealthy hackers," Chronister said.Once hackers gain access to an entire server, cyber criminals go to great lengths to remain undetectable as they sift through their new goldmine of information. Instead of extracting the "gold" all at once, they take it little by little over months to avoid detection, rerouting traffic from the target's server to their own, in low enough numbers to stay under the radar.Clinton says she never sent nor received any classified information that might be valuable to foreign spies. But access to a Secretary of State's inbox, even if it only contains private and nonclassified emails, is still worth quite a bit to an adversary.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div>"To say it wasn't compromised is to say, 'I don't know if it was compromised,'" Stewart Baker, who served as general counsel to the National Security Agency under George W. Bush, <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/could-hillary-have-compromised-presidents-barack-obamas-emails-115955.html#ixzz3U6crYrTR">told Politico</a>. "It would be pretty easy for a nation-state to compromise that account, and easy to hide the fact that they'd compromised that account."In any case, the concerns surrounding a high-ranking White House official with a private domain that wasn't nearly as protected as government servers will serve as a warning. "We'll just have to wait and see what comes out," Chronister said. "Hopefully this will teach government officials that even they have to follow the rules." <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/barack-obama-body-man-reggie-love-2015-2">Here's what it takes to be President Obama's right-hand man</a></h3> <div> <div> <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="g1N2NwczpXSDrnuf4uTcS7BnUmwlMLeM" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div> </div> </div> </div>

Expert hacker: Hillary doesn't know who read her personal email

<div class="image-container float_right click-to-enlarge" style="width:400px"><div class="image"><a title_source="Wikimedia Commons" title_caption="Japanese F-15" class="zoomin" href="http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/50e836f569bedd2922000018-960/japan_air_self_defense_force_f-15-(1).jpg"></a></div><a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Japan_Air_Self_Defense_Force_F-15.jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a>Japanese F-15</div>China's first ever invasion of Japan's airspace happened just weeks ago, but the move appears to becoming a routine addition to the burgeoning standoff.
The <a href="http://www.straitstimes.com/breaking-news/asia/story/japan-scrambles-jets-head-china-plane-flying-near-disputed-islands-20130105">AFP now reports</a>:
Japan scrambled fighter jets on Saturday to head off a Chinese state-owned plane that flew near islands at the centre of a dispute between Tokyo and Beijing, a Japanese <keyword id="6354810" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="100" keywordseo="Defense">Defense</keyword> Ministry spokesman said.
The Japanese jets were mobilized after a Chinese maritime aircraft ventured some 120 kilometres (74 miles) north of the Senkaku islands, which China calls the Diaoyus, at around 12:00 pm (0300 GMT), the spokesman said. The Chinese Y-12 twin-turboprop later left the zone without entering Japanese airspace over the islands, he added. It was the first time Japanese fighter jets had been scrambled this year to counter Chinese aircraft approaching the islands, the spokesman said.
This second round of confrontation in the skies comes after Japan dispatched eight fighter jets last month after provocations in the same region of the <keyword id="430735" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="South-China-Sea">South China Sea</keyword>.
As <a href="http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/energy/2012/10/121026-east-china-sea-dispute/">Taiwan also lays claims to the islet</a>, and its supposed billions in oil and gas deposits, China's increasing its presence and also backing its claims by sending the newest warship it has to the region.
The Taiwan-owned China Times reports the Liuzhou Type 054A warship entered the South China Sea Fleet of China's PLA Navy just days ago, making it the <a href="http://www.defence.pk/forums/chinese-defence/84213-chinese-navy-plan-news-discussions-43.html">sixth 054 warship</a> in the area.
Though the Type 054A is not a new design, this most recently commissioned vessel will have <a href="http://liuzhou.mca.gov.cn/article/gzdt/201206/20120600320943.shtml">the latest technological advantages</a>. 
From <a href="http://www.wantchinatimes.com/news-subclass-cnt.aspx?id=20121231000005&amp;cid=1101">China Times</a>: 
Liuzhou is currently considered one of China's most advanced surface combat Type 054A vessels. It has a stealthy hull design with sloped surfaces and radar absorbent materials. Equipped with a medium-range air defense missile system, the vessel is capable of destroying air targets at a distance up to 50 km. Although it is not as lethal as the Russian-built Sovremenny class and domestic destroyers, the new frigate still serves well as a multi-role warship in the Chinese fleet.
Among all 16 frigates in the same class and currently in the service of the PLA Navy, Liuzhou is the newest addition. Since Liuzhou is commanded by the South Sea Fleet, which is based in Zhanjiang of Guangdong province, analysts believe that its primary mission is to protect Chinese interests in the disputed South China Sea. The mainland and five other countries — Taiwan, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei — have competing claims to the region's islands and atolls.
The Liuzhou's deployment comes days after the U.S. vowed to <a href="http://thediplomat.com/asean-beat/2012/12/18/u-s-increasing-military-presence-in-the-philippines/">increase its military presence</a> in the Philippines and China's ensuing outrage over the decision.
The warship carries an <a href="http://www.jeffhead.com/TYPE054A/index.htm">array of sophisticated weapons</a> including anti-submarine ordnance and stealth features allowing it to evade radar and move undetected.

Japan Sends Fighter Jets After A Second Ever Chinese Invasion Of Its Airspace

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right click-to-enlarge"><div><div class="image on-image"><a title_source="Annie Machon" title_caption="Annie Machon, former MI5 surveillance officer." class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/56992021dd0895c33b8b478b-960/annie__machon_kiev.jpg"></a>Annie MachonAnnie Machon, former MI5 surveillance officer.</div></div></div>One of the most depressing aspects of the appearance of a "new Jihadi John" video is that the man killing the prisoners in the video, <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/islamic-state/12085706/Calls-for-terror-suspect-bail-shake-up-after-Saddhartha-Bhar-blunders.html">Siddhartha Dhar, was known to UK security services before he fled to Syria</a> and had even been arrested by British police before being let go on bail.Dhar had also repeatedly shown up at Islamic extremist rallies in the <keyword id="6354868" type="COUNTRY" weightage="60" keywordseo="UK">UK</keyword> and had appeared on TV advocating the terrorist cause.This is not unusual.The first "Jihadi John," <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/jihadi-john-suspect-mohammed-emwazi-escaped-britain-in-back-of-a-lorry-10087015.html">Mohammed Emwazi, escaped from the UK to go to Islamic State/ISIS/Daesh even though he was known to MI5</a> and was on the Home Office Warnings Index.The ringleader of the Paris attacks, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, entered and left the UK before planning the attacks. And <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/islamic-state/12085706/Calls-for-terror-suspect-bail-shake-up-after-Saddhartha-Bhar-blunders.html">five other Islamists linked to Dhar left the UK undetected</a> in the months prior to Dhar's execution video.So why is the UK so bad at keeping tabs on terror suspects?Business Insider has noted before that the job is more complicated than it sounds, even after the suspect has been identified. In France, for instance, former French intelligence counter-terrorism chief <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/its-logistically-impossible-for-police-to-track-terrorist-suspects-samy-amimour-2015-11">Louis Caprioli estimated that it takes 18-20 officers to keep an eye, 24 hours a day, on any one suspect</a>.There are 6,000 employees at GCHQ and 4,000 at MI5. But there are up to <a href="http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/uk/crime/article4560510.ece">3,000 suspects in the UK</a>. At the French ratio, you would need 60,000 officers to track them all. That's almost half of <a href="http://www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/SN02615.pdf">Britain's total number of police officers, 127,000</a> (PDF). It's an impossible job.So we asked <a href="http://anniemachon.ch/">a former MI5 operative, Annie Machon</a>, how they do it. Machon was once responsible for monitoring IRA suspects in the UK in the 1990s. She left MI5 in 1996 to blow the whistle on domestic spying and abuse citizens' privacy rights. <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Spies-Lies-Whistleblowers-Shayler-Affair/dp/185776952X">She is now an author</a>, speaker and PR consultant.Business Insider: Could you tell me very briefly what you did for MI5?Annie Machon: Sorry my cat's just walking all over me, James Bond never had this problem. Briefly, I worked for MI5 for 6 years in the early to mid-1990s. I was recruited to be a new generation of intelligence officer because they were moving into looking into terrorist targets, particularly the IRA at that point, which was a very different type of work to that which they previously did, which was counter-espionage, counter-subversion.I was there for 6 years and I worked in 3 different sections. First on the counter-subversion desk, then the Irish terrorist desk, and then looking at international terrorism. I was the officer in charge of Irish terrorist logistics, so the movement of personnel and arms into and out of the UK.BI: A French security agent told the FT that to keep one person under surveillance for 24 hours a day, it's going to take 18-20 agents per suspect. That was surprising to me. Is that reasonable??AM: I would say that is conservative, that would be the sort of number to put someone under mobile surveillance. But if you're that interested in someone, you're likely to have other people co-ordinating operations, running operations to get into their offices, their cars, whatever, and you would have all the warrants in place to be intercepting communications. So, you know, the team could be bigger than that, that would just be the human mobile surveillance. ?BI: Wow, OK, and is this why these ISIS people are seemingly able to come and go through the ports because there are hundreds of them and we'd need thousands of officers to keep track of them all??AM: Not particularly. I think the intelligence agencies are drowning in info at the moment and because of that they're not specifically targeting people who might be of interest. If you look at most of the attacks in the west that have occurred over the years, most of these people have at some point been on the radar of some of the agencies. Many of them have already been approached by the agencies who try and recruit them as agents or to warn them off saying, "We know what you are doing, stopIf you look at most of the attacks in the west that have occurred over the years, most of these people have at some point been on the radar of some of the agencies. Many of them have already been approached by the agencies who try and recruit them as agents or to warn them off saying, "We know what you are doing, stop it sonny."<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right click-to-enlarge"><div><div class="image on-image"><a title_source="Annie Machon" title_caption="" class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/56992021dd0895c33b8b478c-960/hi_res_publicity.jpg"></a>Annie Machon</div></div></div>The resources are spread so thinly because they are doing this industrial-level data mining trawl on all of us.?So roll back 25 years, god, to when I was looking at the Irish target, there was a lot going on and resources were still scarce and, therefore, you would focus on the people that you thought were an imminent threat. You had to bid for the resources and put together a strong intelligence case, you had to know what they might be about to do and why they were top of the list.That's actually quite a good process to go through because then you do actually focus on the people who might be an imminent threat, while keeping the others on your mind.?Because they've had this golden opportunity with technology and the internet, because they could and did hoover up as much info as they can, that's actually hampering their work and damaging national security.?BI: Is it mostly people sitting at computer terminals, or is any of this done the old fashioned way, with blokes following you from 5o yards down the road??AM: It's a blend. If the person is of immediate interest, then it would be blokes following someone from 50 yards down the road.? The old approach used to be that you had a range of investigatory tools, which you deployed in the best way to get what you needed.?Since 9/11 particularly, with the Americans ramping up the war on terror, it is getting overrun with technological surveillance and that's where they are drowning.Intelligence officers used to spend a lot of time trying to piece together someone's life using all these different tools. Now of course, most people just offer a lot of this up on Facebook: this is who I'm in a relationship with, these are my friends, these are my political views…? The intelligence services are overwhelmed with all this info coming in. Profiling people is how you keep track of them.?BI: MI5 only has about 4,000 employees right now, what other security assets are they using?AM: There's any number, I wouldn't know the total number off the top of my head. The way it works is, MI6 gathers international intelligence abroad, GCHQ gathers the electronic evidence and MI5 runs the operation.? So if you're an intelligence officer there you're given a target, Iraq, for example. There are known targets and around those targets you determine who might be of immediate interest and you then deploy this range of resources to investigate these targets.?If you're an MI5 intelligence officer, it's not just the tools you have, but also coordinating with other agencies, like GCHQ. Across the UK, each individual police force has its own counter-terrorism department. You'd coordinate with them if they are moving through that specific area, plus you could be in contact with customs and a whole array of different people.BI: Is the co-ordination between agencies good? Or is it clumsy and lumpy and chaotic??AM: Er, the latter, (she laughs). I've been out of it so long now but I doubt it has changed significantly. Everyone expects security agencies to protect the world but they're actually competing for resources and power. And knowledge is power, so they tend to halt and hug their knowledge close to each organisation's individual chest. Particularly between MI5 and MI6 and between MI6, MI5, and the police.?There are plenty of examples which <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Spies-Lies-Whistleblowers-Shayler-Affair/dp/185776952X">I wrote about in my book</a>. When they were transferring primacy of investigations of the provisional IRA from the Met to MI5 in the early 1990s, the Met were pretty pissed off and they did everything they could to impinge the effectiveness of what MI5 were getting up to.?BI: Is it the same when we're talking about other countries? Services in France, Turkey, Greece for example.?AM: It's less competitive but it's just as difficult and fractious because people want to protect their own sources and information.?One thing I would throw in is this dragnet, industrial-scale surveillance is drowning in information. In fact, there's another whistleblower out there, Bill Binney, a former NSA technical director. He blew the whistle a few years ago now - sort of an inspiration to Edward Snowden.The NSA, as it was beginning to get to grips with the war on terror, obviously faced certain of conflicts like should we be doing this to our fellow Americans? It's against the Constitution. So Bill and his team built a program, "ThinThread," which selected those who were of legitimate interest, but the NSA junked that in favour of dragnet surveillance.Technically it is possible to be more selective and more targeted, I think they would be a lot more effective if they went back to that premise.? <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/obama-has-best-trump-insults-2015-12">Obama has been getting the best of Trump for years</a></h3> <div> <div> <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="F5dXY4dzpedDTqGtZWvjQdvLnFUPnk3E" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div> </div> </div> </div>

A former MI5 agent told us why it's so easy for Islamic State terrorists to move around without being noticed

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div>The Iranian foreign minister might be <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/top-iranian-nuke-negotiator-ordered-to-stop-screaming-at-john-kerry-2015-2">habitually screaming at his American counterpart</a>, but that they're at least scheduled to renew talks in Geneva this week raises the possibility that a final nuclear deal could be in the offing.Time is running out, after all: Barring another extension, the Joint Plan of Action, signed in Geneva in November 2013, will expire July 1. The sides <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-30180968">planned on reaching a "political agreement" by March 1</a>.And as the Brookings Institution's Suzanne Maloney <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/why-iran-nuclear-talks-are-deadlocked-2015-1">argued in a January 21 article</a>, the talks have been a disappointment even for some supporters of the negotiating process, with Iran showing little flexibility on key issues.The urgency of the negotiating round has reportedly led to the US softening its position on a crucial demand. <div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div>This week, controversy erupted when the Israeli government allegedly leaked supposed details of the American negotiating stance, which included assertions the US would be willing to let Iran keep 6,500 uranium enrichment centrifuges under a final agreement. <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/18/world/fear-of-israeli-leaks-fuels-distrust-as-us-and-iran-hold-nuclear-talks.html">A New York Times report</a> on February 17 stated the US offered to let Iran keep 4,500 centrifuges in an offer made last fall, but that "there is now talk of raising that figure to 6,500 centrifuges." This isn't that important, at least according to an anonymous American official that quoted by the Times. "They tell part of the story, like how many centrifuges we might consider letting the Iranians hold," the official said in an apparent reference to the alleged Israeli leaks. "What they don't tell you is that we only let them have that many centrifuges if they ship most of their fuel out of the country."The thinking on display here is that stockpile control is the key to a nuclear deal. US negotiators believe restrictions on enrichment and rigorously enforced enriched uranium stockpile limits - along with other caveats, like the aforementioned requirement that Iran ship its enriched uranium to Russia, where it will be converted to non-weaponizable fuel rods - will be able to prevent Tehran from accumulating enough high-enriched uranium to construct a nuclear weapon undetected.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div>By this logic, the problem with Iran's nuclear program isn't its 19,000 centrifuges, secretive and heavily guarded nuclear facilities, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/20/world/middleeast/un-says-iran-still-evades-queries-on-possible-nuclear-work.html?smid=tw-share&amp;_r=0">weaponization</a> and advance centrifuge research, Revolutionary Guards Corps involvement, ballistic missile program, and plutonium reactor. Instead, the problem at hand is the much more narrow and solvable issue of preventing Iran from having enough plutonium or high-enriched uranium needed to actually construct a bomb within a certain time limit.So, the latest reports suggest Iran would be allowed to keep between 4,500 and 6,500 centrifuges. According to Olli Heinonen, a senior fellow at Harvard University's Belfer Center for Science and <keyword id="6356001" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="international">International</keyword> Affairs and a former deputy director general for safeguards at the International Atomic Energy Agency, a nuclear weapon requires 5,000 separative work units (SWU) of uranium enrichment. (SWU is a standard unit for <a href="http://www.eia.gov/tools/glossary/index.cfm?id=Separative%20work%20unit">measuring the effort</a> needed to separate uranium isotopes.)Each Iranian centrifuge produces 1 SWU a year, although the country has 1,000 more advanced machines capable of producing 5 SWU. So it would take Iran about six months to create a single nuclear weapon with 10,000 centrifuges if it had no previous stockpile of low or high-enriched uranium to bump up to weapons grade. At the moment, Iran has over <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/11/08/us-iran-nuclear-uranium-idUSKBN0IS0AO20141108">8 metric tons of low-enriched uranium</a>, shortening its path to a bomb.Interestingly, one of Iranian supreme leader Ali Khamenei's stated "red lines" in negotiations is 190,000 SWU a year (No. 8 below).<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div>The reasoning for letting Iran have those 4,500-6,500 centrifuges in any deal is that they wouldn't be numerous or efficient enough to produce nuclear weapons faster than international monitors could detect them. Just keep enriched uranium stocks below a certain level, the thinking goes, and the Iranian nuclear crisis is solved as Tehran keeps it nuclear infrastructure while its economy is open to the rest of the world.However, there's one glaring problem with this train of thought: Heinonen told Business Insider that "there's no technical reason" for Iran to possess 5,000 centrifuges. That said, there are three primary reasons why Iran would keep enriching uranium after a nuclear deal: securing its enriched uranium stocks for civilian reactors, maintaining its mastery of the nuclear fuel cycle, and/or remaining on the threshold of a nuclear weapons capability (or actually obtaining it) so as to further project its power throughout the region.Only the last of these requires nearly as many centrifuges as Iran is asking for and what US negotiators are reportedly willing to give.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div><h3>Reason 1 for enrichment: Getting enriched uranium for a civilian reactor</h3>If Iran were really building a nuclear program for purely civilian reasons, it could just purchase all of its enriched uranium from a foreign seller. The price per SWU has gradually increased in recent years, but not to the point where buying foreign enriched uranium is more expensive than say, building an expensive indigenous program that may result in diplomatic isolation and crippling international economic sanctions.Most countries have figured that out by now. There just aren't that many places with their own domestic uranium enrichment infrastructure.Russia is the global enrichment leader, producing 26 million SWU a year, according to the <a href="http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Nuclear-Fuel-Cycle/Conversion-Enrichment-and-Fabrication/Uranium-Enrichment/">World Nuclear Association</a>. Germany, the Netherlands, the UK, and French chip in another 20 million or so combined, largely thanks to Urenco, the venerable European multi-national widely considered to be the civilian industry leader. Japan, Brazil, and Argentina all have small enrichment facilities. India enriches uranium for its nuclear submarine program, and North Korea has its own illicit program.The United States has dozens of civilian nuclear reactors. But the US actually imports the vast majority of its enriched uranium and has no currently operating industrial scale enrichment facilities, Heinonen says. Here's the Department of Energy's breakdown on the origin of civilian use enriched uranium since 1994. Ever since the late 1990s, US power plants have acquire most of their enriched uranium from overseas:<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image"></div></div></div>The US isn't the only country with an extensive nuclear infrastructure and no active enrichment program. South Korea has 23 nuclear power plants, but is <a href="http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Country-Profiles/Countries-O-S/South-Korea/">prohibited from developing an indigenous enrichment capability</a> under a bilateral agreement with the US.Which brings things back to Iran. As Heinonen explained, Iran would need somewhere on the order of 200,000 centrifuges (i.e., near Khamenei's red line amount) to domestically supply enriched uranium for the Bushehr reactor. Otherwise, Russia could to continue to fill stocks.<div class="KonaFilter image-container"><div class="image on-image"></div></div>"Iran has this long-term contract from Russia so they don't need to do enrichment themselves," Heinonen, the Harvard fellow, told BI. "And if they did do it themselves they need many more centrifuges."Significantly, there's no reason Iran absolutely needs to enrich its own uranium. The price of an SWU's worth of enrichment has gone up slightly over the past few years, but the estimated $27 million to fund Khameini's demand of 190,000 SWUs pales in comparison to the <a href="http://www.cfr.org/iran/sanctions-affect-irans-economy/p28329">heavy economic cost of the sanctions</a> Iran has had to endure as a result of its program. <div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div>And uranium itself has actually <a href="http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Nuclear-Fuel-Cycle/Uranium-Resources/Uranium-Markets/">decreased</a> in price lately, even if the price per SWU is creeping incrementally upward. Basically, global enrichment capacity far outstrips demand."There's an oversupply of enrichment services," Heinonen said. "At this point in time, it's almost double [the global] enrichment capacity compared to the needs."At the end of the day, as the World Nuclear Association <a href="http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Country-Profiles/Countries-G-N/Iran/">notes</a>, Iran's major project developing uranium enrichment capability "is heavily censured by the UN, since no commercial purpose is evident." <h3>Reason 2: Mastery of the fuel cycle</h3>Heinonen sees one practical reason for Iran to keep its centrifuges: keeping up its mastery of the nuclear fuel cycle even under a greatly reduced program. "I think they want to be kind of a threshold state, where they can take a step either for peaceful or non-peaceful purposes," Heinonen says. "In order to maintain your skills you need to work with [the centrifuges] ... you cannot just shut them down."Keeping up this nuclear expertise would conceivably require a "demonstration scale" cascade where Iran runs "several parallel cascades, to demonstrate that you can handle a great number of centrifuges," says Heinonen. Nevertheless, that doesn't explain why Iran would need 4,500 to 6,500 centrifuges. According to Heinonen, a "demonstration cascade" can be maintained with only 1,000-2,000 centrifuges.<h3>Reason 3: Staying on or surpassing the nuclear threshold</h3>Importantly, allowing Iran to keep 4,500-6,500 centrifuges would be to let Tehran remain within striking distance of a nuclear weapon.The reported number of centrifuges allowed is thousands more than what Iran would need to maintain some minimum degree of nuclear enrichment expertise. Furthermore, 4,500-6,500 centrifuges would place Iran on the cusp of what it needs to build a nuclear weapon in between six months and a year. That would allow them to maintain the threat of short-term nuclear breakout - and the amount of time assumes Iran has no hidden uranium stockpiles or enrichment facilities. <div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div>There's a larger principle at stake, though. A deal including 4,500 centrifuges or more would make Iran one of the few countries in the world to have its uranium enrichment formally legalized under an international treaty.Strikingly, this wouldn't happen as the result of an alliance with the US. The US has a <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/04/AR2008090401614.html">nuclear cooperation treaty</a> with India, for instance, but Delhi is a longstanding US economic and political ally and a fellow democracy. And this wouldn't be a reward for Iran's virtuous behavior on the world stage. Iran's uranium enrichment is banned under <a href="https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Security-Council-Resolutions-on-Iran">several UN Security Council resolutions</a>. Tehran is still a <a href="http://www.state.gov/j/ct/rls/crt/2013/224826.htm">US-listed state sponsor of terrorism</a>, and its assistance is responsible for Bashar al-Assad's regime hanging on in Syria.Under an agreement that allows Iran to keep thousands of centrifuges, Iran will be given a greenlight to enrich uranium - something it has no practical need to do - thanks to decades of recalcitrance, single-minded policy dedication, and <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/sep/25/iran-secret-underground-nuclear-plant">outright deceit</a>. It would be a historic and nearly unprecedented accomplishment, and one with unknown implications for the future of nuclear proliferation. <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/iphone-headphones-tricks-2015-2">14 things you didn't know your iPhone headphones could do</a></h3> <div> <div> <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="o2OGM3czpWcydnvhjbkDBd6feXPuExiD" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div> </div> </div> </div>

An Iran nuclear deal is coming into focus, but there's one glaring problem

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right click-to-enlarge"><div><div class="image"><a title_source="Uber/Vimeo" title_caption="" class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/5384fc81eab8ea62166cd618-960/uber-17.jpg"></a><a href="http://vimeo.com/77249014">Uber/Vimeo</a></div></div></div>A former limo driver recently wrote a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, complaining about Uber. 
In the letter - sent to Holder last Friday - Joe Jordan says that Uber is actually violating federal law. 
<a href="http://www.lctmag.com/blogpost/104104/operator-launches-limo-website" target="_blank">Jordan left his post as president of the Limousine Association of Houston in March 2011 to start</a> the "Limo Insider Report," a site dedicated to limo and taxi industry news - it has a marked anti-Uber bent. So yes, he is a former lobbyist for an industry that wants to see Uber die. You should take his letter with a pinch of salt. 
On the other hand, government intervention is the main threat to Uber. There is only one reason Uber operates in San Francisco and New York but not in Las Vegas or New Orleans - in the latter cities, government has made Uber illegal. 
Taxi lobbyists want Uber to abide by the same laws that taxi companies have to. That includes licensing all cars and drivers, providing cars with access for the disabled and not discriminating against riders from minority neighborhoods. Uber can't guarantee any of these things.
"UBER is totally illegal and has overwhelmed the law enforcement, transportation and airport authorities all across America," Jordan wrote in a letter to Holder, provided to Business Insider. "The situation has gotten completely out of hand and will only get worse without Federal Intervention."
It's not clear whether the Department of Justice even read this complaint. But this is how DOJ investigations get started - by people complaining in writing. If the DOJ were to take any of this seriously, it could mean bad news for Uber.
In New York for instance, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/new-york-attorney-general-on-uber-2014-4" target="_blank">the New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is investigating whether Uber's surge pricing is actually legal</a>.
So even if this letter to Holder produces no response, it still underlines to biggest weakness in Uber's business model: It's vulnerability to the lobbying of established taxi companies and the government regulation that might produce.
Business Insider has reached out to the DOJ and will update this story if we hear back. 
Here's the full letter:
FORMAL COMPLAINT AGAINST UBER TECHNOLOGIES
Sent by CERTIFIED MAIL RETURN RECEIPT REQUESTED
Hon. Eric Holder Attorney General of the United States U.S. Department of Justice 950 Pennsylvania Ave NW Washington DC 20530-0001
Dear Attorney General Holder,
I am writing you today as a concerned citizen and Licensed Limousine Operator.
In order for me to engage in the business of transporting the public for hire over US Roads, I have to be licensed, drug tested, fingerprinted and have a full FBI background investigation. My cars have to be inspected and I must carry first-dollar commercial livery insurance that is in force 24/7/365.
There are companies in San Francisco that claim to be "Ridesharing Companies" or an "Internet platform connecting drivers with passengers". These companies are dispatching specific vehicles, collecting the fare by credit cards and paying the drivers. These companies are in fact actual Limousine and Taxicab companies, but are crossing state lines and evading all laws, regulations and insurance requirements.
Here are some of the ways UBER Technologies is violating Federal Law:
1) UBER discriminates against handicapped persons in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). They do not have a single wheelchair accessible vehicle anywhere in the USA. UBER also refuses to let people with seeing eye dogs ride in their cars.
2) UBER discriminates against blacks, Latins and minorities by refusing to enter "Undesirable" neighborhoods for pickups or drop-offs. (Taxicab companies by law must go to any address requested).
3) UBER's App has secret codes for rating passengers. This could be for people of color, bad tippers, old people needing help getting in and out of the car, etc. Again, racial profiling and discrimination.
4) A prominent Houston regulator was on a recent visit to Washington DC and told us he used the UBER App to get a ride. He asked the driver if he had licenses and insurance. The driver replied, "Yes but not for this jurisdiction. UBER encourages us to cross state lines and go where they need more cars. They say they will pay our tickets if we get caught"
5) UBER misclassifies its drivers as "Independent Contractors" when in fact, they are working as employees. Using the IRS 21 point checklist, you will see that UBER micro-manages drivers, trains them and has them do things only employees do. No UBER driver has workers comp. If they are injured in an auto accident, UBER will not help them or pay any of their medical expenses.
6) Distracted Driving. In order to use the UBER App, a driver must always be focused on the smart phone screen and a GPS screen. This distraction was listed as a probable cause of a fatal accident on new Year's Eve when an UBER driver ran over and killed a six year old girl.
7) Evasion of USDOT insurance requirements. UBER is sending commercial vehicles across state lines without proper insurance. The insurance they do have is a surplus commercial liability line that is not real car insurance. Several states have issued warnings about UBER's fraudulent insurance.
http://www.idahostatesman.com/2014/05/22/3197321/ride-share-services-such-as-uberx.html?sp=/99/103/
8) FORMAL RICO CHARGES AGAINST UBER. There are three active Federal Lawsuits against UBER,in Houston, Chicago and Connecticut.
http://mobile.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-22/uber-lyft-face-racketeering-lawsuit-by-connecticut-cab-groups.html
UBER goes into cities like Bonnie and Clyde and just starts operating illegally. City, County and State law enforcement and transportation agencies and airport authorities are overwhelmed and need Federal Assistance to control this illegal plague of unlicensed pirate taxis sweeping the nation.
9) ILLEGAL STOCK FRAUD. UBER claims to have ten billion dollars in Venture capital, yet there is no SEC filing on obtaining these funds. The venture capital investors knew or should have known that UBER is considered totally illegal in 13 states but provides them with funds to operate anyway. This is aiding and abetting a continuing criminal enterprise.
10) UBER cars cross the Canadian border and operate illegally there. The whole operation is controlled and manipulated from offices in San Francisco. So here you have not only crimes committed by illegal unlicensed vehicles crossing state lines; but international borders as well. This is undisputedly within the jurisdiction of the U.S. Department of Justice.
http://toronto.ctvnews.ca/unlicensed-uber-car-service-facing-charges-1.1835374
11) UBER FREELY ADMITS THEY ARE FLAUNTING THE LAW.
Here are some troubling quotes by the UBER CEO, Travis Kalanick:
a) On the UBER website investor blog, he states: "We will begin operations in any city where we perceive there to be little or no enforcement of transportation law".
b) "If they don't enforce, they must endorse" (Our behavior)
c) "A Cease and Desist letter only means "You shouldn't be doing that", but we say, oh yes we should".
SUMMARY: UBER is totally illegal and has overwhelmed the law enforcement, transportation and airport authorities all across America. The situation has gotten completely out of hand and will only get worse without Federal Intervention. Already one six year old girl has been run over and killed and an UBER driver has been charged with rape of a passenger. There also allegations of massive bribery of public officials.
RECENT OBSERVATIONS OF THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE:
1) There is a link on the USDOJ website listing the accomplishments since you took the office of Attorney General. These are impressive and certainly something you should be proud of:
http://www.justice.gov/accomplishments/
The latest update was July of 2013, however. Don't you feel it would be nice to make a major arrest and successful conviction of a group of people who brag about breaking state and federal laws while getting away with it?
2) Attorney General Holder, your recent article on "Nobody Too Big to Jail" was certainly a bold statement and in a perfect world, would make many things right and secure your place in history as a great Attorney General. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/05/doj-too-big-to-jail_n_5267238.html?icid=maing-grid7%7Cmain5%7Cdl11%7Csec3_lnk4%26pLid%3D472520
UBER claims to have ten billion dollars in capital. Their major investors are Goldman Sachs, Google and Amazon. How about it, Mr. Attorney General, are those people "Too Big to Jail"? We are waiting..........
HERE IS THE SOLUTION: Everyone is annoyed by constant complainers who never seem to have an answer for all the problems they experience in life.
The crux of the matter is that UBER cars use a smartphone for assignments. City, county and state governments do not have the electronic resources to see the extent of the problem, identify the cars and drivers and issue them tickets. The cars are undetectable to the naked eye.
The National Security Agency (NSA) does have these resources and while the military and intelligence communities are constrained by the Posse Comitatus Act, there is a program called CALEA. (Communications Assistance to Law Enforcement Agencies).
As a former Senior Intercept Analyst at NSA, I can assure you that my colleagues there could easily solve this conundrum for you in very short order. I would be glad to recommend some of the right people to talk to at the Puzzle Palace at Ft Meade if you have difficulty pursuing this.
FINAL THOUGHTS: Your job description, more than any other person in government, is to ensure justice, law and order and see to it that people and corporations behave and operate in ways that maintain and enhance the American Way of Life.
Here in Houston, the commencement ceremony was recently held at Texas Southern University, which is predominantly minority. The speaker was prominent Houston attorney Joe Jamail.
1985, a Texas jury returned a $10.53 billion verdict for Jamail's client, Pennzoil Co., against Texaco Inc. It remains the largest verdict upheld on appeal in legal history anywhere in the world. ...
In his closing comments, Mr. Jamail commented on his life experiences and people and events that shaped him. One was his parent's admonition, "Always be outraged at injustice; an injustice to anyone anywhere is injustice to everyone everywhere"
If you could define UBER with one word; it would be INJUSTICE.
Attorney General Holder, all Americans in their heart of hearts want to be proud of you. You only have a relatively small amount of time left to ensure your place in history as a man of honor, integrity and a man who had the courage in the face of great opposition from those who would tell you to look the other way as you pushed them aside and did what needed to be done anyway.
It is our sincere hope that you take this issue up and return the transport of the public to conform to established laws and regulations designed to protect public safety, prohibit discrimination and enhance the efficient movement of people in commerce across state lines.
You have the power to make this a reality if you choose to do so.
The eyes of Texas, and the rest of the country, are upon you.
Respectfully,
Joe L. Jordan, Editor Limoinsider Report 14173 Northwest Freeway #166 Houston TX 77040

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